The Sweetest Kind of Comfort
by quondam
Summary: Before the final mission to disarm the bomb on Tuchanka, Shepard and Tarquin Victus spend the night finding comfort in one another.


_Note: Definitely a mature rated story, although I edited out some of the most graphic parts for FFnet. Available on the "masseffectkink" journal on livejournal, Part XI, page 9, if you're interested in the original and more explicit version. I'd link it here, but alas, FF doesn't allow me to, and I'm still waiting on an AO3 invite._

* * *

Shepard's head hurt. Not from a nasty fall or lack of sleep or even an overuse of biotics like an L2 would have suffered from, but instead from the general avalanche of _bullshit_ that was compounding and compressing within her skull. It was Earth buried beneath Kaidan's wounds, a fresh squeeze of Cerberus coated in Palaven's destruction, sandwiched between the jackasses of the council, rolled in a generous helping of Krogan and Turian relations, and topped with the delicious cherry of—oh, what was that?—oh yeah, a _fucking bomb_ planted by the Turians ages ago and that Cerberus now had their indoctrinated claws dug into. Yeah, it was great alright, and if one more thing dared add itself to the dogpile of problems, Shepard was going to end up in medical while Chakwas slept, digging through the drawers for some painkillers to dull the noise. _The good stuff._

As it was, it was late, and though her body ached for sleep, the pounding behind her eyes wasn't exactly behaving. Nights like this months ago when the SR-2 had been Cerberus owned, Shepard spent her hours searching for minerals to fulfill upgrades, the mindless process a home away from home for her more plaguing thoughts. Back then it had been colonists and Collectors and waiting for the shoe to drop with the Illusive Man, and planning a fool-proof way to get herself killed once their mission was completed beyond the Omega-4 Relay, because only in death did she really think she would find peace. Of course, that hadn't worked out, and now—though she never admitted it—Shepard wasn't sure if she was happy she had survived to help the people of the galaxy, or angry because it meant another set of impossible hoops to jump through before she could consider planning another comforting death scenario.

A cup of tea was in one of her hands, sipping at the tepid liquid as she sifted through the new mix of incoming messages. Traynor had hit the racks for the night, and thank god for that. She was a helpful, bright girl, who thankfully was not as talkative as Kelly Chambers had once been, but Shepard always felt her presence nearby, fearing Traynor's next interjection. Rather than mentions of how the crew was fairing, Traynor always came with news of some new mission, some other group of people that needed helping, and Shepard, ever the girl scout, always heeded the call even if she should've been sleeping or drinking herself into oblivion between dockings.

The door at the far end of the starboard side of the room opened, and Shepard instinctively raised her head and stood from her slouch, eyeing the unknown. For a second she thought it was Victus, abandoning his post in the war room to finally catch some sleep, and while she was right, she was also wrong. It wasn't Adrien, it was _Tarquin, _the same clan markings but his overall pigmentation a shade lighter_._ Her brow furrowed, blinking through the drowsiness as the Turian stepped out, one of her own crew following nearby with weapon slung loosely in their arms as they acted as escort and guard.

Tarquin looked even worse than she felt, and though he and the human had been proceeding along the walkway of the CIC, presumably towards the airlock, both stopped as they spotted the commander awake at that hour. Her crew member paused, saluted, and Tarquin fell into line a half a step later, saluting her even if she wasn't in his chain of command.

Shepard raised her mug of tea limply, not bothering with protocol, but they got the hint and stood at ease. "Didn't know you were on my ship, Lieutenant."

"My father requested a meeting with me. I—" he nervously fumbled, "—I wasn't aware you didn't know. I apologize, Commander."

Maybe in morning light she would have sought out the person who had granted him access and chewed them out for the lack of information, but Shepard wasn't exactly sure if she hadn't been passed a datapad or e-mail or memo at some point in the last few hours and simply given the okay without reading it. She'd have to double check later.

"I assume that didn't go well," she said, drinking the now chilled brew. All the appeal the beverage had once had was now gone, the artificial creamer tasting greasy in her mouth.

"No," he stated simply, then gave a choked laugh from the back of his throat. "Doesn't matter. When the storm on Tuchanka begins to pass… the Ninth Platoon will finish their job, and I'll be with them."

There was a sense of defeat in him still, probably even more so than earlier with over half his men dead around him after the fateful crash. Facing one's demons down and then having to report about it to the man who was not only your superior, but a parent… well, she couldn't imagine that going well in any scenario, least of all with the type of species Turians happened to be. "I've no doubt you will," she offered the shallow slip of comfort.

"Thank you—again, Commander. And if you're still able to offer support, I'll see you out there." Tarquin nodded his head, gave another salute, and turned to continue on his way with his escort standing by.

Shepard, for a reason she couldn't yet place her finger on, didn't turn back to her work.

"Lieutenant—wait."

They paused, Tarquin's head craning back in her direction with a question on his face, brows shifted.

"Dismissed, Schultz. I've got it." The girl—and she was barely more than that—nodded. She had been in the wrong place at the wrong time when Earth had been attacked, or maybe, she'd actually been in the _right_ place at the wrong time. Shepard had read through the crew manifest enough to know that this girl wasn't on it, had simply been following a delivery of raw materials to the Normandy when the proverbial shit had hit the fan, and when the Normandy had left Earth behind… Ensign Schultz, barely out of basic, had gone with them. Shepard saw something of her younger self in the girl. Terrified but trying not to show it. Kept her nose out of other's business, which often made it hard to find camaraderie, not that people were exactly looking for friends with the galaxy in peril… but, still, there was something there. Schultz, first name Michelle, began to leave. "Do me a favor, give the kitchen a once over and take the rest of your shift off."

Schultz stilled, for a second looking like she didn't know how to interpret the orders, but simply nodded again, offered a polite _Yes Commander_ and hurried on her way. They were a skeleton crew as it was during the day, the nights even more so, but Shepard had seen those bags under her eyes. She needed the sleep.

Tarquin was eyeing her when Shepard looked back to him. "Something I can do for you, Commander?"

"How are your plans going?"

"They're made," he said easily. "We're just catching some shuteye while we can. Or at least that's what I should be doing."

Shepard set her cup aside, discarding it on the countertop where a crew member would find it later. "Got time for a drink?"

—

In her quarters, Shepard passed a glass of dextro-whiskey-equivalent to the young Lieutenant, and downed her own, washing away the thick residue of her previous drink gone sour.

Tarquin seemed less interested in the alcohol than he was in taking in the sights of the place where Commander Shepard resided, eyes shifting from the desk and datapads scattered across it—Shepard quickly did a mental check, trying to recall if anything left there were particularly classified, and thankfully, she decided there wasn't—and even the glow of the fish tank, sparsely filled with a few familiar and unfamiliar creatures. He leaned in close as an eel swam by.

"Press that button," Shepard said, refilling her glass, swirling the caramel colored liquid idly around.

"Huh?" He said, straightening and falling back to attention.

"That button, in front of you right there," she motioned, "push it."

Tarquin hesitated but obeyed the order like any good Turian, and somewhere above or behind the glass there was the soft sound of a mechanism shifting as flakes of food filtered in at the top. The fish and other sea-dwelling inhabitants livened up, rushing to the surface, fighting the others for the largest pieces.

"Fish tank isn't what I expected to find on a military ship," he mentioned, and finally took a sip, barely half a mouthful, of the liquor.

"Seems kind of like a hazard to me too."

Lingering still on the raised platform that signified office from bedroom space, Tarquin nervously turned, looking directly to where she stood among her more personal possessions. He seemed to steel himself, taking on the defensive. "If you invited me here to tell me not to fuck up again tomorrow…" He breathed deep. "You don't have to. I've heard enough of it from my father. I know what's at stake… that failure on my part equates to failing the entire galaxy."

Shepard didn't move, glass poised by her mouth as she watched him. He was achingly still, eyes locked with hers in what she knew had to be a rare moment of defiance for him. There was a challenge there, although the flicker of his eyelids betrayed the strength he tried to show. Garrus was always going around stating and bragging about what a bad Turian _he_ was, but it was inherently different in the way that Tarquin was. Garrus was a bad Turian because he was so perfect—a strong leader, a good soldier—but he chose to buck the rules. Tarquin was a bad Turian—and she decided immediately that there was nothing wrong with that, was she even a good human?—because he just simply wasn't cut out for the life he'd been forced into. Maybe with another man as a father he would have finished his service in a different field aside from the military and been better suited to his assignment. She was sure he wasn't a bad soldier, but a leader? That was different.

"I didn't, actually," she responded coyly, and finished her glass off again, letting the hand holding the dishware dangle at her side as she slowly paced. Even with her eyes not directly on him anymore, Shepard could see him weaken, more unsure of why he was standing where he was. She stopped suddenly, and leaned into the cabinet beside the fish tank. Her free hand raised, she motioned towards her couch, inviting him in. "I wanted to give you some advice."

Tarquin stared, as though the idea of friendly words with a commanding officer was unheard of. He took a moment to consider, quickly downed the rest of his drink, and proceeded down the short steps, crossing that imaginary threshold of work and life and found a seat down on her couch. He leaned over the coffee table and refilled the glass himself, propriety be damned.

"I like your style," she quipped as he poured, and repeated the action for herself before finding a seat on the furthest arm of the couch. Shepard toed off her boots, and brought her feet to rest on the cushion. "For the record, Lieutenant—"

"Tarquin, please."

"Tarquin," she acknowledged, "I don't think your call was wrong."

"It was cowardly," he responded.

"No, it was smart. You saw a problem, an _unforeseen_ problem and adapted. You were at the top of the chain of command out here, no one else to ask. Reaper forces were in your way, if you'd gone straight in, there was a guarantee of a great deal of loss, do you understand that?"

He did, so he dipped his head and took a sip of the alcohol.

"You took the gamble. You played smart, developed a new plan, one that had every reason to work. But sometimes…"

"Sometimes it doesn't work," he said when her voice quieted. "It works for you, Commander. It _worked_ for you. They don't call you the Butcher of Torfan for nothing."

Her face seemed to crinkle and crease all over, upper body visibly pulling away and into itself as she finished her glass off, letting the burn of the liquid wake the rest of her up and give her the courage she needed. "It worked for me, but on another day it might not have. The wind could have blown a different direction and the Batarians might have won out. Besides—Lieu—Tarquin… I didn't come out of Torfan with all my men by my side."

Tarquin watched her, unable to pull his attention away even as her gaze fell on her knees, her feet, her hands. This was the Commander Shepard most didn't know of.

"I sent most of them to die, but I completed my mission. What matters is that when I made the call, when I made the decision to hold out at any cost—I stuck by it. And when someone questioned me, I put them back in their place, I didn't consider the alternatives." She stretched, setting her glass back on the coffee table, but keeping herself perched precariously where she was. "Maybe we could've kept more people alive if we surrendered the ground we had—but it's over, it's in the past. What's done is done. You have to keep their respect, be a leader even when you choose wrong. Don't let them see that you doubt yourself."

She paused and sighed. "I wasn't the commanding officer at Torfan, you know. The Major in charge couldn't handle it. Not everyone's cut out for leadership, Tarquin." Shepard pressed her hands into the arm of the couch beside her, slid from the armrest and onto the cushion, closing the space between them. One leg folded up beneath her, knee brushing into his side, and Shepard's hands curled gently over Tarquin's forearm. Their eyes met, her steely green-eyed gaze to his almost shameful one.

"At this moment, it doesn't matter if this is what we're good at or not. When the war's over, we can all make different choices. But right now," a hand lifted, and she touched the tips of her fingers to the swell of his chest, and even with the armor on, she could feel him tense. "You've got to be who everyone needs. And they need Lieutenant Victus, leader of the Ninth Platoon. A man who accepts his mistakes, but doesn't dwell on them. A man who is fearless, who is dedicated to the mission and his men, and who sees it through to the end. Do you understand that? In this war right now, there is no retreat."

A shallow nod of his head gave his acknowledgement, and when Shepard's fingers finally left his chest, the gentle pressure of her touch there gone, he released a deep, shuddering breath. When he spoke, Shepard thought she knew his words coming. An _Understood, Commander_, or maybe _I won't let you down._

"Do you give yourself this speech every morning?"

No, she didn't see that coming.

It was her turn to go absolutely still, and for a second she had half a mind to turn on him, order him from her cabin for daring to try to get under her skin. She was good at keeping herself in line, maintaining the barrier between Jane Shepard and Commander Shepard, and yet here a complete stranger had seen between her words and with a single question, nudged aside the veil. But his words weren't given in jest or condescension. They were kind, and genuinely curious.

"Twice a day," she said, giving in to the truth, and her hand on his arm squeezed between the armored joints a little tighter.

Tarquin offered something of a smile in return, mandibles spreading for a breath's stretch of time. She wasn't sure what he was thinking or feeling, but for her at least, she felt a sense of—for the first time in a long time—truly not being alone. Someone else, for this glimpse of time in her life, shared the same feelings she did.

There was no presumption of words needing to be said after that, from either side. Shepard relaxed, her shoulders hunching forward slightly as she let the day's tension breathe out of her, and from the next seat over, Tarquin did the same.

"You're a lot more intimidating in real life," he finally said, a laugh following his words.

Shepard's brows furrowed, line forming between them. "Really? As I sit here in my socks and I've got laundry on my bed?"

"Really," he repeated, glancing back to her, their eyes meeting again. Tarquin leaned forward and slid his glass onto the table. "You know, no one is ever going to believe me if I try to tell them Commander Shepard invited me up for drinks and words in her cabin."

"Ah," she smiled, and was glad for the change of subject, "part of the plan, my friend. I don't need it getting out about all the strangers I invite up here at every port."

They shared a small amount of laughter.

"The dextro whiskey on hand implies there's been a number of other Turians, or are you into Quarians…?"

"The more the better," she said, finally standing, reluctantly letting go of his arm. His eyes followed her, and she was acutely aware of it, even as she gathered the soiled cups and set them on her desk along with the bottles of liquor as she sealed them shut.

"I'm sorry," he stated out of the blue.

Shepard turned back to regard him. "For what?"

"That my father lied about this to you. For dragging you into my people's mess. For not getting it right the first time and for asking you to help me clean up my mess."

"Tarquin… it's not your fault. You were put into a shit position, just like all the rest of us. And we've got to help each other out if we're going to get any of this right. You need help, I'm here, I'll do it. And when we leave Tuchanka," she rested up against her desk for support, arms crossing at her chest. "I may need to ask your help, and you'll do it." It was tit for tat, technically speaking, but there was something in her chest that told Shepard that if she really needed the help, if she really asked him, Tarquin would go without duty or obligation getting in the way. Maybe that was presumptuous of her, she didn't know him too well, but somehow she felt she did.

"You're right," he said, standing. "I will."

"Are you going?"

"I won't take up any more of your time, Commander, I know I've overstayed my welcome."

She watched him bow, his upper body tipped quickly forward just a hair and then righting itself. He clung to the rules and customs, even after everything else.

"Tarquin…" Shepard pushed herself from the desk and offered her hand when she was beside him. He took it, accustomed with the Human gesture, shaking it, though their palms lingered together afterward, neither letting go. "You'll do good tomorrow. You'll make your father proud."

His eyes widened almost imperceptibly at her words, bodies still joined by their connected hands. "I… I will."

Before she could even process her body's actions, Shepard reached up, hand touching gently to his cheek. Tarquin's mandible flickered against the heel of her palm and inner wrist.

"Commander?"

"Jane."

"Jane?"

"That's my name. Not Commander."

"Oh."

There was a heat spreading over her skin, the kind of warmth she hadn't felt in a long time, since well before her _death_. It was foreign, a piece of her she'd assumed gone out with her corpse and never come back when Cerberus gave this hunk of flesh and bones life. It was hot but it made her shiver anyway, made goosebumps prick along her bare arms, the hair stand up at the back of her neck, commanding her body not to let her sever that temporary junction where Turian met Human. But it wasn't right, she knew that. It was wrong, so she allowed herself to indulge for only a few seconds more, remembering the feel of another person's hand in hers, and the closeness between their bodies.

She wished she could read his mind, or that she was as familiar with Turian faces as she was with Human ones, hoping for an edge of insight into the man she was staring across at. Was he being polite, not pulling away because she was a superior officer? Or were his words, his actions, kept hedged because of that fact as well? These was a nauseating wave in her throat, body and mind torn apart and at odds between giving in and holding back. She had no right, Shepard told herself. Had no right, and still she wished to every God she didn't believe in, that she did.

Tarquin's hand imitated her own while she was caught in her thoughts, the heat radiating off his palm as it touched to her cheek, finger tips and talons lost in the strands of her hair that covered her ear. It was the kind of touch that meant something more, but she wasn't sure exactly _what_. Shepard wondered for a moment if this was what her affectionate brush of hand to his cheek and mandible had felt like to him, and her eyes moved back up as she considered it. There was tenderness, some of which stemmed from the kindness she'd shown him in the moment of mentoring she'd offered him, but some that was not there before, concentrated in the flecks of color that surrounded his pupils.

"Do you want to stay?"

Shepard could hardly believe the words were her own as soon as they were said. So much so that she wanted to take them back, swallow them down and keep them there for an eternity.

"I… didn't mean that," she quickly interjected, head shaking but hand remaining firm. "It's not an _order,_ Tarquin. It's…" That nausea was back, even worse than before, a reminder of a line she'd crossed. For christ's sake, how _old_ was he? Younger than her, she knew, but by how much? Then there were the considerations of her rank above him, of the position of power she sat in that could convince even the most stalwart of people to comply with what she asked of them. And the regs, God, fuck those regs. They'd kept her celibate for years.

"Spirits," he whispered, breath shaky, "I'll stay as long as you ask."

All at once, that dissension in her stomach and throat faded away, like a cooling balm had blanketed and snuffed out the fire that had caused doubt and questioning.

It was fair game after that, and their hands remained linked together as she leaned in, the other hand at the back of his neck, urging him forward until their mouths met in the common Human expression of affection. It was fast, hard, and above all, a risk. One, that unlike Tarquin's last, proved most fruitful.

His hand found home in her hair, tugging gently at the red strands, while her fingers simultaneously rubbed at the flesh where fringe met scalp. He moaned, mouth departing from hers, and Shepard continued, kissing, licking at his mandible.

"Where'd you learn to kiss like that?" She exhaled the words, hot breath tickling him.

"Asari," he barely got out. "You must've been with a Turian before…" _To know to touch me like that_.

"No," she denied, shaking her head, lips running along his jaw, her nose nudging him to tilt his head backwards and expose the soft flesh of his throat. "Just done a lot of _reading_."

Tarquin laughed, only then reminded of their linked body parts. "I'm going to let your hand go," he whispered, "but don't you dare keep it to yourself."

"Understood, Lieutenant. Now let's get that fucking armor off."

When they did release, both acted on their own, her fingers groping his armor in the familiar spots for latches, his own searching out weak points in the clothing she wore. Neither managed well.

"Let me," Shepard insisted, pulling away from him long enough to pull her shirt from the waistband of her pants, the ends of it coming untucked as she began unbuttoning. Tarquin watched her with hungry eyes, similarly undoing the seals of his suit, dropping it piece by piece to her floor.

"We're crazy," he said.

"Insane," she agreed, shirt gone as she was forcing her pants down, socks with them as she stepped out. Shepard stood back to her full height, and reaching behind her to manage at her bra. She winked. "No one is ever really going to believe you now."

"This is one memory," he said, removing the greaves of his armor, leaving him down to the soft protective layer of his undersuit below, "I'm keeping for myself."

Jane smiled, really smiled, her whole body grinning with it that she had to stop once she felt the release of the clasps at her back, bra going slack and loose around her. Her arms covered her chest, keeping the fabric in place, allowing herself to slow down for a moment in time, and before she could do anything else, Tarquin stepped closer, curled his bare hands in the straps of the somewhat unfamiliar garment. He didn't pull, didn't remove it, just leaned in and this time did the giving, dragging flicking mandibles along her jaw, neck, and clavicle.

"Why me?" He asked, and this time he did tug at the bra, Shepard's arms moving aside and letting the cloth and formed cups of it fall to the floor.

"I don't know," she sighed, and it was a pleasant sigh as he captured a nipple between the plates of his mouth, pulling gently without the use of his teeth. He knew his way around her body, and Shepard would have to thank the Asari race for being so damn similar. "It's… been awhile for me. Years."

"Years?"

"You were probably still in _basic_," she joked, deflecting her own worries.

"I'm not _that_ young," Tarquin replied, lifting his head to stand up straight. Shepard began unzipping, peeling back his undersuit for him.

His hands assisted her in the process of the final removal, especially over the trickiness that were his spurs, letting the last barrier on his skin be removed. He hesitated as she glanced to his hips, suddenly self-conscious of the nothing he presented. "We're not like—"

"I know," she cut in, taking his hands to guide them to her underwear, all sixteen of their fingers working together to push the fabric down her thighs. "And I'm not exactly like an Asari."

This time, it was his turn to smile, mandibles wide. "I know."

Shepard palmed his groin, rubbing her hand along the plates she'd only read about and seen in vids—thank god for being able to hide her extranet viewing habits—even letting her fingers trail along the slit as his plates softened and began to slowly spread apart. Shepard licked the edge of his mandible as she did so. "Because I don't even know you, but I feel like I do."

"What?" His voice was strangled.

"You asked _why me_. Because I haven't felt the need to be with anyone in years, because I thought Cerberus brought me back to life _broken._ And until right this moment, I thought it was true."

"Broken?" Tarquin stuttered, and simultaneously, Shepard felt him emerge from his opening, the smooth length of it expanding in her waiting palm, hot and sticky with it's own lubricant.

She guided one of his hands down to between her thighs to greet the moisture she likewise expressed in anticipation of their coupling, and Tarquin leaned in, mandibles caught in her air, moaning a soft _Oh_ in understanding of her meaning. Shepard spread her thighs as far as possible without reducing her height, and Tarquin stroked over her slowly, teasingly, learning her body's anatomical differences from an Asari. He pulled at one of her legs, allowing her to use him as a balancing aid, and hitched a leg to sit easily at the shelf of his hips and waist. It had the effect of opening her to him even more.

One of Shepard's arms hooked around his neck, cradled between the soft flesh there and the ridge of his cowl, the other continuing to stroke him as best she knew how, listening for hitches in his breathing or tremors of his body for when she did it particularly right. Her weight bearing knee wobbled slightly and Shepard released a sharp, but short, moan.

"What about you?" Her voice was strained, panting. "Why did you stay? Haven't seen a female in months?" Shepard, while she had her own reasons for doing what they were, was under no illusions as to why her partners were usually there.

"I saw your picture years ago, after what happened with Saren."

"Oh?"

"And I thought you were beautiful then."

Her cheeks heated, pinking up even more than they had been from his touch. That wasn't a compliment she thought she'd ever heard, or at least not heard and truly believed it to be more than a line. She was already naked, why did he need cheap words unless he meant them? "I generally thought—Ah!—Turians preferred their _own—_God, don't stop," she moaned into his neck.

"It's easiest," he replied, in far better control of himself than she was, her attention to him having lessened with her otherwise distracted. "But not what we _all_ want."

"Human fetish, got it," and just as she felt herself about to go over, Shepard pulled away on unsteady feet. Tarquin's expression changed from lustful to pained at the distance.

"Did I say something wrong? I don't really have a—"

"Relax," Shepard ordered and reached for his own hand, pulling him with her towards the bed, letting the earlier urgency reignite her. At the bedside, Shepard was no longer gentle, forcing him onto his back along the stretch of her rumbled blankets. He rose, elbows supporting his body as they were propped up behind them, keeping him elevated just enough to watch her. Sinking to her knees, she had no problem in parting his legs, pulling his hips closer to the edge of the bed. Shepard drew her mouth in as close as she could to the base of him, where reproductive organ met his separated plates, and ran her tongue along the seam. Tarquin groaned at the unfamiliar sensation, head tipping back as his muscles tensed.

"Has anyone ever…?" Shepard questioned, tip of her nose brushing against him as she continued to lick, even suck playfully over sensitive skin.

"No," he quickly replied.

She released a hum of surprised approval, tongue trailing along his underside and up to the tapered head. It was swollen, the whole thing stiff as a rod for her, and Shepard leaned in, her curiosity winning out as she tasted it. Salty, musky, and the hint of something else she couldn't identify, almost earthy, like a mixture of spice and herbs, the bitters sometimes found in recipes for old alcoholic beverages from Earth. His legs quivered as she experimentally dipped him into her mouth, letting him rest and drag along the soft bed of her hot tongue, teasing him as long as she could. This wasn't a Turian gesture, not with their rigid lips and sharp teeth, and Shepard intended on making sure he felt all the pleasures of the experience.

A hand gripped around his base, the widest part of him where it connected to his body, and finally did she push her head forward, taking him into her mouth until he could feel the tickle of the back of her throat. The feeling was delirium inducing, his eyes clenched shut in response. Shepard worked him over—for how long, he didn't know, time passing instead in the heaves of his breath and the warm moans in her throat he felt vibrating through—sucking, licking, tasting, her tongue pressed up against the underside, letting it discover the whole of her mouth from the stiffer roof of it, to the pliable flesh of her inner cheek.

His body tightened in preparation of release, but before he peaked entirely and even before he could cough out a warning, Shepard had him slipping from her mouth, the heavy weight of it smacking against his thigh.

"You can't come yet," she lightly reprimanded, kissing the inside of his upper leg, but careful to avoid any and all touching that would push him further. Shepard moved herself up onto the bed, and Tarquin—despite how rapidly his lungs filled and breathed out—was waiting for her, an arm around her to pull her close, their mouths joining together in the kind of kiss that was an amalgam of the preferences of their two species. Her lips met his hard plates, parting intermittently so his forehead could brush hers, mandibles flaring to sweep across her jaw. A quiet laugh rolled from the back of her throat at the unfamiliar mix of Human and Turian.

"I want you inside me," she confessed, hand to the back of his scalp, holding him close as he nuzzled in at her jaw and neck.

"Mm," he returned, "but I'll hate myself if I don't do something else first." And with that, he used the greater weight of his body to force her to her back, him above her. Tarquin didn't hesitate as he drifted southward, and from the way her legs willingly drifted open when he reached her navel, he knew she understood what was coming. The scent of her was intoxicating, and though he wasn't human, hadn't spent millions of years evolutionarily coming to love the sensation of a Human female's musk in his nostrils, a scent so perfect he could nearly taste it, Tarquin became enraptured by it just the same.

"Tell me what to do," he said, and though it was a request, he said it with the kind of strength he usually reserved for ordering his men around. The beginning was obvious, fingers parting her.

"Lick me." Shepard's fingers caressed his cheek before dipping down to herself. She touched from her entrance, running vertical up towards the top, where he could see that even redder, blood swollen, bud of flesh. "There to here."

Her fingers left and Tarquin did as instructed, long tongue relishing the tangy taste of her in his mouth as he moved north. Shepard's legs, one of which was draped over his shoulder, trembled. _A-ha_.

"Around it," she instructed, "slow at first."

Years in the military meant he didn't have to be told twice, his tongue once again put to work moving clockwise around the source of all her body's quaking. Shepard let out an unrestrained moan, loud and high pitched. Suddenly, her other hand went for his, folding back his fingers save for one, and introduced the tip of it against her entrance.

"Careful," she reminded him, there was no question she meant his talon.

"I will be." Tarquin made the promise and then with her guidance slid his appendage inside of her. She was tighter than he'd ever imagined, and for a second he was left wondering if their coupling really would work. It had been years for her, hadn't she said? Years and a body ago since anyone had been inside of her, and that thought alone nearly made him come on the spot. It had been so long since she'd trusted anyone like this, the great Commander Shepard willingly spread wide and vulnerable, and of all the people in the galaxy, she was trusting him. He slid his finger in all the way. Shepard gasped, her hips pressing against his mouth.

He was gentle, rubbing at her inner pillowy walls as they clenched him tight. Her hand grasped around his wrist, directing him as she pleased, pressure applied to the upper wall, working at a particularly distinct spot inside her. Matched with his tongue, Tarquin could tell when the sensation became overwhelming for her as she released him, hand in her own hair or at her breast, squeezing, pulling. Shepard continued to moan, mumbling incoherencies as her back arched against the bed, leaving nothing but air between her spine and the mattress. That hand that had been in her hair grabbed at the back of his skull, pushing and forcing his mouth against her further soon after, and it wasn't much longer before she was finally coming. The heel of her foot dug into his back, finger tips into his plates as her body tensed and gave out all at once as she broke free.

"Jesus Christ," she moaned as she consciously took control of her body again, relaxing both into the bed and against him. Tarquin was licking the remnants of her climax when she looked down to him. The smile on his face, mandibles wide, mouth partially agape: she wished she had a picture to preserve it forever. Her hands pawed at both sides of his cheeks, holding him steady and then pulling lightly, only done to persuade him forward, which he hastily obliged. Their mouths met when the weight of his body pressed to hers, her soft body absorbing his hard lines and cuts. The taste of herself on her own tongue was distantly familiar, memories of lovers long ago lingering in the back of her mind as the Turian kissed her as best he knew despite their anatomically different parts.

Tarquin made no move to enter her, but Shepard was interested, even with her body still reeling fresh off her own release. She curled a leg around his hips, a hand working between them, finding him hard and she stroked him slowly, a few pumps delivered to wake him up, _as if_ he'd ever become unaware. Fingers directed him and when she finally positioned him where her body craved most, Shepard tilted her hips up into him, relishing the feel as he dipped inside her no more than a centimeter.

"Do it," she whispered into his ear canal as he buried his face in her neck, and this was the first time he didn't immediately listen and bow to her experience. Instead, Tarquin pressed a hand to the bed, enough to elevate himself above her and bear his weight, eyes coming into focus on her own face below as they pulled apart.

That was all he needed. One look, one good look at her, one meeting of their eyes together and the exhale of a huff of hot air against his face from her parted lips. He slid home inside of her, pelvises crashing together and meeting rather harshly for the first time. Shepard cried out as he filled her.

Though his mouth ached to touch down back at hers, he kept the distance, just far enough away to watch and read her as he thrust in and pulled out each time. Every shift of his hips to change the angle was measured in a contortion of her facial features, a bite of her lip, the sharp inaudible cry of her voice. And what was more, what was even better, was that when Shepard could manage to not give in, eyes not clamped tight and shut to enjoy the sensation, Jane watched him, equally committing the images to memory.

Tarquin sought out one of her hands and pinned it to the bed above her head as their movements became faster, harder, more violent, both of their muscled bodies competing together to find release. Though she was below, Shepard treated it like she was sitting astride him, riding him just as he rode her. Her free hand slipped around his backside, gripping the hide of his ass to pull him into her further, repeatedly rubbing at the inch of her body that had left her screaming in the past.

Together, they were climbing: deeper, rougher, quicker, and then without warning Shepard froze, clenched around him in every possible way, body seizing, lungs caught. It took a pregnant second for the world to go from _paused_ to back to life faster than an FTL jump, a sharp gasp taken and then called out, chest vibrating in each subsequent breath as her hips moved instinctively into his again, riding out the duration.

He released her hand from above her head to curl an arm around her back, her middle drawn up into his as he resumed his final thrusts. Her body was useless by then, limbs barely more than limp from exhaustion and post-release weariness. Shepard's lips curled in to a smile as she reopened her eyes, they were heavy-lidded, sleepy, hazy, and despite the weightiness she felt to her body, she reached forward, touching his cheek, thumb tracing along the chalky, white markings on his face.

Whether it was coincidence or not, Tarquin's body contracted similarly to hers only moments before, a few last tenuous plows given as he drained inside of Shepard. On top of her, he collapsed, his arm still pinned between her body and the bed, his face affectionately buried into her breast as he panted. For a second of time, the tension and worry of his duties, his father, the galaxy, of Tuchanka, of Palaven… they melted away. Of course, Shepard's hands ghosting along his fringe didn't hurt either, nor the sweet smell of her soap and the heady scent of her sweat mixed together. All of it, well, it was a recipe for the sweetest kind of comfort he was sure he didn't even deserve.

The comfortable heaviness of another's body over her own brought Shepard back to memories long since past, a deja vu of a life lived before her death. That was how things were divided for her now: prior to Alchera and after. This world of after, after death, after Cerberus, after Alliance Prison, after the Reapers invaded… it had become something of a living nightmare for her. When she slept, her dreams were haunted by it, thoughts plagued by those she'd seen dying as well as her own plunge towards darkness. That feeling of suffocation, she was no stranger to it even now, reliving the experience on a weekly basis. And when she was awake, the world was just as bad, maybe even worse because there was no escape. It was no nightmare she could wake from, curling into the arm's of a lover and hide away from the worst. It was real. Horrifically, painfully, real.

But for a second, beneath another, even if Tarquin was so unlike the Humans she'd taken into her bed in the past, it was a reprieve. A shelter from the storm. For that, she stroked the crest of his forehead, picking her head up to lean forward, neck muscles strained just hard enough to kiss where her fingers had brushed a second earlier. She settled her head back down and watched the unmoving stars above her.

"Are you alright?" Tarquin asked, meek and quiet, probably more of an indication of the man he truly was when being a Lieutenant and a Victus didn't come first.

"Yeah."

He was mindful when he slid his arm out from under her, the other arm pushing at his upper body weight to lift himself. Tarquin made a move to disengage their bodies, knee into the bed as he began to pull out, but Shepard quickly put that idea to rest, her knees cradling his hips in tightly.

"Stay," she whispered and looked away from the skylight to meet his eyes. A series of creases formed between her brows as she made her request. "Just for a minute."

Though he didn't remove himself from her, he took care to rest on his elbows, at least to offer her lungs and diaphragm a break from his bone-crushing weight. Their eyes locked.

Tarquin cleared his throat. "Can I ask you something?"

Shepard swallowed, throat visibly bobbing. "Go for it."

Her short hair was splayed, fanned out across the bed, and Tarquin let his fingers tangle in it, stroking the unfamiliar strands. This was the first time he'd ever been close enough to a Human to touch it, to experience how silky it felt against his skin. "Why'd you join the Alliance?"

Her eyes shut in response, and Jane breathed out a heavy, shuddering sigh. The kind of exhale she'd been, in some ways, holding for half her life. Tarquin could see her eyes moving beneath her eyelids, as if reliving memories long since past, debating internally whether or not to answer the question he'd posed. He regretted the question as they lingered in silence, and was halfway to opening his mouth, asking for his inquisition to be recalled, when Shepard's eyes blinked open.

"I was sixteen when Batarian slavers attacked the colony I lived on with my family."

That was a story she didn't need to finish. Tarquin knew tales like that far too well, even if such occurrences rarely happened to Turians. Shepard went on.

"I was young… and stupid… and weak. I couldn't fight back, I didn't know how. So when they murdered my family, when they shot my father for trying to protect my mother, when they raped my mother and slit her throat when she made too much noise, when they dragged my brother off with them and shot him in the back when he tried to escape, do you know what I did?"

It was a rhetorical question, one he couldn't respond to even if he tried.

"I hid," her face contorted, corners of her mouth turned downward in an expression of sorrow, the kind of pain and tears she hadn't thought to shed in a decade. "I hid like a coward and watched them die, kept quiet because I knew if I made a sound, if I yelled, if I cried—" Tears welled at the edge of her eyes and she did what she could to hold them back. Compartmentalize, that was what she'd always done. Bury the past away, never revisit it, and if she had to, if her brain betrayed her and thought back, she had to see it with a cold, clinical, soldier's eye, not the eyes of the daughter that was effectively made an orphan on a unseasonably cool summer's night. There was no rationale to why she was sharing the details of her past with an almost complete stranger—but maybe that was it, after all. He didn't know her, not really, and that made it easy to be honest where she'd never opened up to others before.

Tarquin stroked a finger along her brow, brushing shorter strands of her hair aside. He wasn't good at comforting others, it wasn't something Turians ever really asked for once they were beyond childhood, even if he'd wanted to on many occasions in his adult life. The concept was foreign, but he did his best, even wiped a thumb pad at the corner of her eye to help keep the secret of her tears.

"So when I turned eighteen, I joined the Alliance. Because I knew if they ever came back for me…" And she knew that was an irrational thought. Her colony life, once the Alliance had set foot on Mindoir rescuing her from the charred remains of homes and farms, had ended. But regardless, it stayed with her. "I would be ready. I would be strong enough to fight back, to save the people I loved."

It was only a few sentences, a handful of words comprised into one complete thought. And yet… Tarquin thought in that instant, however wrong he was, that he understood Jane Shepard, utterly and completely. She was a woman pushed to the brink, the mask for a girl that had died over a decade ago, that fought every battle like she was protecting the mother, the father, the brother she'd lost on Mindoir. The galaxy had become the replacement for what was taken from her.

Tarquin brushed his cheek into hers, feeling the exact moment before she let out a quiet, strangled cry, her arms slipping around him, drawing him in close. He didn't pull away, didn't dare try to look her in the eyes as she shattered just a little, giving her the blessing of being able to at least pretend she was holding herself together far better than she was in reality. It didn't last long, the heaves of her chest becoming regular again, and when she loosened her hold just enough, he lifted his head to kiss her. Shepard weakly reciprocated the gesture.

"I don't have to ask," she said against his mouth, "why you joined."

He pulled back. "Even if it wasn't mandatory, I would have because of my name. That's just how it is for Turians."

Shepard smiled despite reddened eyes that betrayed her. "Not many Turian poets, eh? Is that what you always wanted to be?"

Tarquin laughed to himself, head shaking, allowing her to deflect. "No… I don't know what I'd be doing if it wasn't this. I never let myself think about it since there wasn't a point. I was always going to follow in my father's footsteps."

"I want to say that when this is all over, maybe things will change… but I know better than that," she admitted.

"You're right. The need for the military will be even more than it was before, and if I even make it out of this alive—"

Shepard's hand came to his mouth, fingers folding over his plated lips, silencing him. "Don't say that. I'm going to see you at the end of this, Tarquin."

He blinked, letting the pessimism fade as he nodded back to her. The fingers covering his mouth slid away. "Well if Commander Shepard says so, then it must be true." He wore a cocky grin.

"Mm," she purred, rubbing his neck. "I do say so, if only because you're going to owe me so fucking much for helping you tomorrow." From behind thick eyelashes, she glanced up at him. "And I intend to collect on it."

"That a promise?"

Jane smiled, teeth bared. "Yeah. Yeah it is."

Gently, she pushed a hand to his shoulder as her legs fell weakly to the sides. It had been more than the minute she'd asked for, and though her emotional state was far more precarious now than ever, she allowed him the ability of disconnecting their bodies. Tarquin shifted, pulled out. They both gave a disappointed sigh and he rolled onto his side next to her.

"Was there something else you wanted to do?" He questioned, hand pressed idly to her belly, stroking her from hip to hip. "Before the Alliance?"

Shepard directed his hand from her stomach up to her breast, both hands folding over the back of his own as she forced him to cup at the swell of flesh. "I wanted to be a teacher. That's what my mother did."

"Any subject?"

Her head shook. "Younger kids, you know? Teach them all the basics, get them a good start in life."

"There will be time, eventually. However far down the road."

Shepard sighed, head turning it on it's side to look across to him. "I shouldn't be around anyone's children, not with the things I've done. I'm not a role model for anyone. Sometimes I wonder what my parents would think of me. They were peaceful people, didn't even want to keep the rifle they had. And their daughter grows up… she commits genocide against hundreds of thousands Batarians, she sends her friends to die, she wakes up in the morning and doesn't even blink knowing she's going to kill a dozen people, if not more, at some point in her day. I do it, wipe the blood off my armor, and sit down to have lunch with the dirt still in my hair. I wish it was different, but this is what I'll do until the day I die."

"When this is over…" his hand left her breast to find her cheek. Shepard cupped his hand there as well, nuzzling into it. "I don't know what this is. Well, I think I do. But I hope it's not—"

"Just spit it out," she ordered.

"I want to see you again when this is over. Maybe you and I can try to figure out what we were meant to do, without the military." His eyes watched hers, and then he added, to press the point further. "Together."

Shepard blinked steadily. "I know this was great for you…"

"Don't. Let me go into tomorrow thinking that if I do everything right, if I come out the other side of this war breathing, that I've got a chance with you in the end. Let me believe it."

"That wasn't…" She touched his cheek, mimicking his action in kind. "I just meant that this isn't an obligation. We fucked, you've stayed the required amount of time to not be an asshole, your duty is done here. You don't have to _pretend_ that there's something more."

"Spirits, Jane, I'm _not_. You really suck at listening."

Her eyes narrowed, like it was the first time someone had tested her in that regard.

"I really don't know what this is," he continued on, "but I know what I want it to be. Or what I want to at least try for it to be." Tarquin stopped, eyes shutting. "This is all very… forward. But when am I going to have the chance to say it again?"

"Never," she admitted, sitting up. Her back was given to him, and still she felt his fingers affectionately stroking the skin at the small of her back, reminding her she wasn't as alone as she may have felt. Always felt. It was a little thing, but at the same time… it was a lot.

Tarquin watched for a moment and then followed her upright, their shoulders brushing. Shepard turned into him immediately, rising on her knees, straddling one of his legs, resting against his bare thigh. Her hands sat in parallel on either side of his head, and Shepard leaned in, pressing her smooth forehead to his plated one. Her words were demanding. "Why? Why do you want this?"

"I'm going to use your answer," he replied, caressing from her shoulders on down her back. He tilted his head, pressed his mouth to her lips to provide her with the Human affection. "I don't know."

She clung to him afterwards, arms circled around his carapace, fingers barely meeting and locking at the widest point of his back while her face hid itself away into his neck. It was peaceful, the kind of calm she hadn't felt in so long, a comfort that she could distinctly remember by a warming heater in her parents' modest home after dinner, her stomach full from the kind of rich food her mother used to make. Safety, that's what it was. There was no reason for it, no logical reason at least, but…

"Alright," Jane hesitantly whispered, once again barely believing her voice when she heard it swimming in her ears. "When we're finished, you and I… we'll try this again." She felt his fingers tighten in her hair, his mandible brushing against her scalp.

"There's something about you," he hummed in satisfaction, "I don't know what it is."

She didn't say it aloud, but she'd have to agree.

Shepard sat up straighter, arms loosening though her fingers still played with the plates at various points of his body. "I know you have to go."

Tarquin ventured a glance around the room for any kind of timepiece. Spirits, he was supposed to be back with his men, catching some sleep over an hour ago. He found, surprisingly, that he cared far less than he should, even with all that was sitting on his shoulders.

"But lay with me. Sneak out when I've fallen asleep."

Like most of her words tonight, it was a request, not an order. Tarquin nodded, arm hooked around her as he shifted them back some more towards the headboard. Shepard slid from his lap and peeled back the layers of blanketing for the two of them.

"Is it going to be okay—with your fringe?"

His head shook dismissively and Tarquin laid on his side, head on one of her pillows, bypassing the problem entirely. His arm spread across the empty space beside him, invitingly, and Shepard took the bait, coming to rest with her head on the meat of his upper arm, body turned in towards his. Her leg raised and curled around his waist.

When the room was quiet, nearly silent save for the bubbling of air into the fish tank, Tarquin spoke up again, his voice a nervous whisper. "Do you really think we'll be able to stop Cerberus tomorrow?"

"Yeah," she affirmed, eyes shut. "You're not the kind of man who will let himself fail, Tarquin. You'll finish your mission. You'll make your father proud."

He sighed, letting his muscles achieve supreme relaxation into the bed. "Will it make you proud?"

"You don't need that from me—"

Tarquin cut her off. "Will it?"

"You'll do your job, help save the galaxy in the process. And maybe, maybe in the end you'll get the girl, too."

—

The storm dissipated later than they'd expected, and as Shepard sat in the Kodiak, team prepped and ready until they got the all clear to head planetside again, Jane dreamt of the night before. She thought of the bold promises they'd made, his words that had inspired her to kick rational thinking and logic to the wind, to give into hope when there was little to be inspired.

He'd left her not long after their last words, and though he'd believed Shepard to be asleep, she hadn't been, not entirely. She'd felt the kiss he'd dropped to her forehead, the push of blankets back around her to ward off the cold. With his back to her, she'd even spied him dressing again, the reluctant turn of his body lingering at the entrance of her cabin, the glance of longing he'd given back to where she lay. He'd left then, made it back to his ship, or so she'd confirmed with EDI this morning. Tarquin was with his men now, and she hoped that even a little bit, she had convinced him to be the man he needed to be for them today.

"That eager to get the Krogan rutting like there's no tomorrow, Lola?" Vega asked from his seat across the way.

She blinked out of her haze, brows pressed together in a question at him. "What?"

"You're smiling."

Her cheeks heated at the realization of his words, and how even now, the corners of her mouth ached from a long-worn half smile.

"So long as they do it when we're off Tuchanka and spare your virgin eyes," she lied, "I'll be happy."

James opened his mouth to reply, but was interrupted by Steve shouting from the cockpit. "Joker's given us the signal, Turians already en route. Strap in, though, we're bound to hit some turbulence once we hit the atmosphere."

—

Down on the planet, Tarquin hovered over the console of the exposed bomb. He turned back towards her. "And thank you, for making sure I get this chance." There weren't seconds to spare, but he bowed his head, their eyes meeting even as a cloud of dust settled around them.

She wanted to take his hand, to reassure him when he needed it—forget that, _when she needed it_—but with his soldiers and her teammates lingering close by, it wasn't the time, nor the place. Instead, Jane settled for a nod of her head, the wink of an eye.

"Just make it right, soldier."

A bullet whizzed by, taking out one of his own. Adrenaline poured into her veins just as quickly as medi-gel would have, and Shepard took off running. She would buy him the time he needed, give him the chance to rectify his wrongs.

—

They met back at the bomb as Cerberus laid on the final assault. Tarquin growled in frustration, backing unsteadily away from the main console. "I've got to separate the trigger from the bomb. Now! Cover me!"

Shepard stuttered in her steps and in the firing of her weapon, chancing a glance back to him as he headed for the ladder.

"Be careful," she reminded.

He paused on the first rung. "When it's all over, Jane," he started, letting the bullets ring out in the air as the conclusion to his promise. Tarquin resumed the climb to the top.

There was a sickening ache in her stomach as soon as she turned back towards the commotion ahead of her, James hurling a frag grenade at an engineer, Liara tossing a singularity at a gaggle of unshielded troopers. The roar of firepower drowned out the sounds above her, the creak of the bomb's chassis, the heavy footsteps of the Turian desperately trying to not only save the planet, but at this point, _their_ asses as well.

_He'll do his job,_ she told herself, and she believed it, she really did. But that pain in her gut told her that wasn't the end of the story. Tarquin would do his job, he'd do it so good in fact, that he'd get his victory…at any cost.

The framework groaned. Shepard looked up, caught the sight of the man who'd spent the previous night in her bed but was now hanging from the side of the long-buried machinery. One hand slipped from the grip.

"Tarquin!" She shouted, her voice strained, knowing what was coming before she saw it with her eyes.

He pulled out the final trigger mechanism and the metalwork lurched, snapping his body off and away, left hurtling towards the pit below. Shepard reached out as though she somehow would have been able to stop him, grab him, coax him to safety, but he was already gone by then, the machine falling in after him.

The dust rose along with the fire of the explosion, and Shepard saw Mindoir all over again. Another person gone, another person from her life lost that needn't be.

—

On the return trip to the Normandy, Shepard sat in the shuttle, quiet as a mouse. She leaned forward, elbows on her knees, head hung in contemplation. Around her, the crew talked of the Krogan and the Primarch, a man now without a son. Selfishly, she thought of the hint of a future she no longer had, the brief lover that had promised her more for the first time in her life, had promised to stand beside her at the end for no reason other than he simply _wanted_ to.

It had been the Batarians that had taken the people she loved from her the first time, and though no one said it to her outright in the aftermath of Torfan, she knew she'd earned the name _the Butcher_ with the images of her family and friends in her heart.

Jane slid the mask back in place, the cover Tarquin had pushed away for her only hours before to reveal the girl that had been lost on Mindoir, the one she'd hope she could someday be again.

The Reapers and Cerberus, they were responsible for her loss this time. And the Butcher… she would give them hell for it.


End file.
